


Morning Light

by Rehearsal_Dweller



Category: Maleficent (Disney Movies)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-11
Updated: 2019-11-11
Packaged: 2021-01-27 16:56:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,967
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21395557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rehearsal_Dweller/pseuds/Rehearsal_Dweller
Summary: "I've known better than to tell your mother I love her for a long time. It's no great loss."
Relationships: Aurora & Diaval (Disney), Aurora & Maleficent (Disney), Diaval/Maleficent (Disney)
Comments: 19
Kudos: 483





	Morning Light

**Author's Note:**

> I'm less happy with this than I was with Small Talk but I figured I'd put the time into it so I might as well share it anyway. Maybe you guys will like it better than I do.

Aurora heard her family coming before she saw them. She’d known the sound of Diaval’s approaching wings as long as she’d known anything, and while Maleficent’s heavy wing beats were a more recent addition to her aural memory, they were no less distinctive or easy to identify. She reached the balcony just in time to watch them land, Diaval changing smoothly in midair from raven to man.

“Godmother!” she greeted with delight. “Diaval! You’re back!”

“Good to know all this association with humans hasn’t interfered with your observational skills,” Maleficent replied, though her smile betrayed teasing where her tone did not. She opened her arms and her daughter rushed forward to hug her.

When Aurora pulled away from Maleficent, Diaval was waiting for her, and she fell into his arms too. He kissed the top of her head as she stepped back. 

She looked from one to the other and back, a wide smile on her face. “I have some news! We’d hoped to tell you sooner, but no one knew how to contact you.”

“Don’t keep us waiting, then,” said Diaval, waving a hand to prompt her on.

“We’re having a baby!” Aurora announced. She ran a hand over her stomach, smoothing the fabric of her dress over it to show them. 

“How soon?” Maleficent asked, studying her.

“About two more months,” replied Aurora. 

“We’ll stay on until the baby comes, then,” Maleficent said. “If that is acceptable to you.”

“Oh, yes!” Aurora’s smile was almost blinding. “I rather hoped you would!”

“Consider it done then.”

Diaval stepped toward Aurora again, and at a nod from her laid his hand on the bump, smiling softly. “This makes you a grandmother, Maleficent.”

“And _you_ a grandfather,” Aurora said, letting a hand fall on Diaval’s shoulder.

He froze under her fingers. “Aurora –“

“You’re the only father I’ve ever known.” Aurora frowned. “You raised me, along with Godmother. What else would you have my child call you?”

“Diaval,” Diaval said helplessly. “_You_ just called me ‘bird’ for the first years of your life.”

Maleficent stood by, not saying anything. Diaval looked over at her, something wild and nervous in his eyes that Aurora couldn’t quite identify. “If you’d really prefer not –“

“Aurora,” Diaval repeated. He opened his mouth as if to speak again, but closed it. He looked back at Maleficent again, pleading.

She turned him back into a raven with a flick of her hand and he’d flown inside before Aurora could say anything to him.

“What was that for?” Aurora asked, a little annoyed.

“He –“ Maleficent paused, looking over Aurora’s shoulder in the direction Diaval had flown. She shook her head. “It was what he wanted.”

“Why?” Aurora pressed. “He’s never missed an opportunity to remind you how much of my upbringing was his own doing.”

“You reawoke a recent argument between him and myself,” Maleficent said. She touched Aurora’s shoulder, catching her gaze. “Don’t let it worry you, Beastie. He’ll come around.”

“To me, or to you?” asked Aurora.

“You, Aurora, have never had to win Diaval over for anything.” Maleficent straightened up, stretching her wings a little. “Being called your father is not the issue. I’m quite sure it’s your _mother_ that offends him.”

“But you –“ Aurora faltered. She glanced back over her shoulder.

“Don’t worry,” Maleficent repeated.

Aurora let out a slow breath. “I won’t, then. Come inside, won’t you? It’s nearly time for breakfast.”

\--

Diaval was human again that afternoon, and Aurora decided it wasn’t worth frightening him off again by bringing up their previous conversation. At least, not right away.

“Take a walk with me through the garden?” she asked instead, smiling sweetly at him.

“If you’d like,” Diaval replied.

So they walked, slower than they might have a few years ago, but steady. Aurora caught her godfather up on all that had gone on in the kingdoms while he and Maleficent had been away, and in turn Diaval told stories of their travels.

She sat down on a bench overlooking the Moors. Diaval sat next to her, close enough that their legs touched from hip to knee, and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. Aurora rested her head on his shoulder.

“You are happy, aren’t you?” she asked quietly, a faraway look in her eye. “About the baby?”

“Oh, _darling_,” said Diaval, squeezing her closer and pressing a kiss to her forehead. “Oh, Aurora, Rory mine, of course I’m excited.”

“Earlier, you just seemed –“

“That was _not_,” Diaval interrupted, “about the baby. Your mother and I have just –“

“Just what?” Aurora pushed when Diaval faltered. He looked away, rubbing the back of his neck with his free hand. “What’s wrong, Diaval?”

“You’ve your own worries, fledgling,” Diaval said. “You needn’t tangle yourself in mine.”

“Not such a fledgling anymore,” said Aurora. She rested a hand on her stomach. “And I’ll always have room in my heart to help my family with their troubles.”

“How on earth,” he said with a half-laugh, “did Maleficent raise _you_?”

“She had help.”

“Your aunties are just as self-absorbed as she is.”

“I meant you.” Aurora pushed her shoulder into him playfully. “What’s the matter?”

“The truth?” Diaval asked. He turned back toward her, trying to read her face.

“It would be nice,” replied Aurora.

“You’ve never called me your father before,” Diaval told her. He had a crooked half-smile on his face, his eyes a little misty. “Not that I blamed you; lord knows fathers are a sore subject.”

“Then I’ve overlooked something terribly important,” said Aurora, smiling back at him. “For you’ve been more of a father to me, even as a raven, than Stefan ever was.” She reached across him and took his hand in hers.

“Especially as a raven, I’d hope,” Diaval said. Aurora laughed, nodding. “Good.”

“Is that all? Godmother mentioned you’d argued.”

“I wouldn’t call it an argument,” said Diaval.

“She did.”

“She would.” He sighed deeply. “I told her I loved her. Quite by accident, mind you.”

“You did?” Aurora was so startled that she twisted out of Diaval’s arms to face him more fully, as if by looking him in the eye she might catch him in a lie. “You told her?”

“By accident!” Diaval repeated. He shook his head, the arm that had been around Aurora’s shoulders falling to his side. “She was standing at a cliff’s edge, watching the children fly as the sun set, and she was just so beautiful that it slipped out! I didn’t think she was near enough to hear me say it!”

“But she did hear you,” Aurora guessed.

Diaval’s face fell. “She heard me. And you know how she is – content to love and be loved, just so long as none of us dare name it.” He let his gaze drift back over the Moors, though Aurora could tell his mind was someplace else entirely. “The hurts of her past still haunt her so.”

It saddened Aurora to see the look on his face. He hurt for himself, from whatever Maleficent had said to break his heart, but she knew well that he hurt for his mistress, too. “What did she say, Diaval?”

He shook his head. “It doesn’t bear repeating. Suffice to say the whole conversation spiraled entirely out of my own control, and we were left standing about ten feet apart debating our own roles in raising you.”

“And I brought the subject a little too close for comfort?” Aurora guessed.

“Right,” said Diaval. “You always were a bright little bird.”

“How long ago was this? Your not-argument,” asked Aurora.

“A month,” Diaval said. “Or so. Around when we decided it was high time we come home to you.” He tucked a strand of hair behind Aurora’s ear. “It hadn’t actually come up again, you know. You just cut a little too close.”

“Sorry, Diaval,” said Aurora. She rested a hand on top of his. “She’ll come around one day.”

“I don’t need her to,” replied Diaval. At her slightly disbelieving expression, he continued, “Truly, I don’t. We may not talk about it, but she knew before. And she may never say it, but I know she loves me, too.”

“And I love the both of you,” Aurora said decisively. “For I have the best parents in all the lands.”

Diaval laughed. “If you say so, Aurora.”

\--

True to Maleficent’s word, she and Diaval stayed on until the baby was born. They stood together, not quite touching, as Aurora looked down at her brand new son. Phillip, who was perched on the bed next to his wife and son, waved the two of them and his father closer. Aurora angled the baby toward them, grinning.

“Godmother, Diaval, John, meet Florian,” she said.

“He looks just like Phillip did as a baby!” John replied.

Maleficent and Diaval exchanged a subtle look, as neither trusted themself to speak without saying something along the lines of, _so, like a baby?_

Aurora shot them a knowing glare.

“He’s very small,” Diaval said eventually, suppressing a laugh. He didn’t know what one was supposed to say about a human baby to its parents; it hadn’t ever come up when Aurora was a hatchling.

Maleficent nodded seriously. “And loud. That’s an important survival skill.”

“Thank you,” replied Phillip. Diaval could tell he was slightly baffled by their comments by the look in his eye, but appreciated the boy’s good sense for just taking them as compliments.

“Would you like to hold him?” Aurora asked Maleficent.

“Best not.” She smiled at her daughter. “Perhaps when he’s a little bit less _fragile_.”

“Diaval?”

Diaval kissed Aurora’s forehead, then Florian’s, but didn’t take him from his mother. “Maybe next time, darling.”

John happily took the baby when offered, tickling his little toes and talking to him in a silly voice. Diaval and Maleficent looked on, both keeping their distance a little.

They were set to return to their travels four days after Florian was born. Aurora insisted on seeing them off, so early on the morning of their departure she met them on an upper balcony. Phillip insisted on accompanying her, so he met them there too. Aurora passed the sleeping baby to her husband to hug her parents.

“You’ll be back soon, won’t you?” Aurora asked. “Not months and months this time.”

“Of course, Beastie,” said Maleficent. “In time for the christening at the latest.”

“I’ll hold her to that,” Diaval added, winking at Aurora. She smiled.

“I’ll miss you terribly,” Aurora said.

“And we’ll miss you,” Maleficent replied.

“We love you,” Diaval said in a low voice. Maleficent was close enough to hear him, but this, he knew, she’d allow.

Aurora hugged each of them one last time. “Goodbye!”

A few hours later, Maleficent and Diaval stopped for a break from flying. The sky was still stained pink by the rising sun, and Maleficent turned to Diaval with the bright smile she only got when she’d had a really exhilarating flight, and it just about took his breath away.

“Did she ever convince you?” Maleficent asked. “Are you to be grandfather to young Florian?” She smiled. “Or will he call you bird?”

“That depends, Mistress,” said Diaval. He caught her eye and amended, “Maleficent. Can his grandmother stand the association?”

“I rather think she can,” said Maleficent. She was close to him, near enough to touch. “I’ve heard she even loves you.”

Diaval spluttered, taking a half step forward but immediately rocking back to his previous footing. “You –“

With a wave of her hand, she shifted him back into a raven. He squawked indignantly but followed as she took off into the rising sun. They’d have words about this later.

For now he just chased her further north. Maybe one of these nights they’d catch a glimpse of the lights their daughter was named for.

**Author's Note:**

> Baby Florian is named after (the very unofficial name of) Snow White's prince. I wanted a Disney connection but _Eric_ felt a little on the nose and lord knows I couldn't just name him "Charming."


End file.
